


doubt

by lipsstainedbloodred



Series: these are the ways that i love you [2]
Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: M/M, Nightmares, Pining, Pre-Relationship, post episode 159
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-25
Updated: 2020-01-25
Packaged: 2021-02-27 11:27:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,916
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22396306
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lipsstainedbloodred/pseuds/lipsstainedbloodred
Summary: “I really loved you, you know?”I know, Jon thinks, I know, it’s too late, I know.Or, the fic where Jon and Martin have a moment of rest after the Lonely.
Relationships: Martin Blackwood/Jonathan Sims
Series: these are the ways that i love you [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1553053
Comments: 14
Kudos: 247





	doubt

Jon’s flat is cold and musty. It’s obvious from the moment they step inside that it hasn’t been occupied in some time. The curtains are pulled tight over the windows, the light from the street peeking around the edges with a hazy yellow hue. Dishes have been left in the dry rack, a mug on the counter containing something that might have once been tea. It is stifling in its bareness, empty walls and heavy bookshelves. The only point of warmth comes from two hands clasped together in desperation. 

Jon takes a moment to look at their hands and realizes Martin is shivering. “Sorry,” Jon says, “I’ll get the heating on.” 

Martin is still looking at him like he had in the Lonely, wide eyed desperation and disbelief. He’s beautiful, and Jon kicks himself for thinking that distress looks good on Martin. When he tries to untangle their fingers Martin clings on tighter. 

“Martin?” Jon asks. 

There’s an edge of panic to Martin’s voice, “Don’t- don’t let go- I-“

_ Oh.  _ Jon gives Martin’s hand a quick squeeze. “Alright,” he says, and the smile on his face almost feels genuine.

“Can we-“ Martin shudders through a breath, “Can we just sit down a moment?”

“Yes,” Jon feels frozen in place for a moment before starting forward. He feels like a puppet, moving in stop motion. “Of course, let me just-“ He pulls them both forward into the sitting room. 

The couch can barely be qualified as such, as broken down and threadbare as it is. It does contain a liberal coating of blankets draped across its concave back, leftover from the days when Jon felt the need to swaddle himself in as much warmth as he could find. Long before his crawl through the Buried made that feeling more panic inducing than safe. 

Jon pulls the blankets around them now, pressed together hip to hip, their hands still held tight together. Martin makes himself small next to him, resting his head on Jon’s shoulder. He looks exhausted and Jon just wants to tell him that he can rest now. That he can put all his weight on Jon’s shoulder. That Jon can hold him up. 

He doesn’t say that. He doesn’t say anything. He just holds Martin’s hand and concentrates on not rubbing his thumb across those half-bruised knuckles in a way that would be far too intimate for the two of them. 

“Thank you,” Martin breathes, closing his eyes. 

Tea would be a wonderful distraction. Martin is solid and not quite warm beside him but rapidly becoming that way, leeching the heat from Jon’s skin. Jon wants to pull him closer, let Martin crawl into the skin of him until they are not two but one and Martin never feels lonely again. He wants to touch. He wants- he wants-

Martin’s hand tightens where Jon’s fidgets, fingers becoming shaking and anxious. Martin swipes his thumb over the back of Jon’s hand thoughtlessly, pulling a choked sound from Jon’s throat. 

“Are you all right?” 

“Fine,” Tears prick at the bottom of his lashes and he wipes them away, pretending to rub his eyes, “Tired, you know?”

“Yeah.”

He doesn’t remember falling asleep.

  
  


He’s alone in a room, solid concrete walls and the whir of a tape recorder that he can’t see. The carpet is threadbare under his feet, socked toes curling into the bare patches. And it’s cold, it’s so cold. 

“Martin?” Jon whispers. His hands feel empty and useless so he clutches at his bare, shivering arms pimpled with gooseflesh. “Martin!”

There is no door. There has never been a door here. The walls are too solid for doors, thick and wet and gray. A ceiling fan whirs overhead, almost the same frequency as the tape recorder. There is a desk where the not desk was before and the tape recorder is there as it always has been. There is no stop button, no rewind, just the endless whir forward. It is listening, but Jon does not know what for. 

“Martin!”

Martin had been here once, in this alone room that was not a room but a prison. He was not anymore. Martin did not need to be anywhere anymore. 

The tape stops with a sudden click that is almost deafening in the absence of everything. The ceiling fan above slows and slows. Stops. 

Jon’s heart is the loudest thing in the room. He sees it sitting there on the desk, pumping arrhythmically, though there’s no blood for it to push through its valves and ventricles. Jon cradles his heart in his hands. 

The ceiling fan begins to spin again, backwards this time, and the tape in the recorder begins to play. It’s a mismemory of Martin’s voice, the tone and intonation are wrong, or Jon thinks they might be wrong, but maybe they aren’t. 

“ _ This is where I should be. It feels right.” _ A click, like the tape is skipping, like a recorder set to the wrong track.  _ “Nothing hurts here. It’s just quiet.”  _ Jon lets his heart fall to the ground. He doesn’t feel it when he steps on it. His fingers clutch at the tape recorder, knuckles white where he grips it.  _ “Even the fear is gentle here.”  _ The recorder clicks and skips again, skipping past Jon’s reply. Martin laughs, distorted and mirthless. “ _ I really loved you, you know?” _

I know, Jon thinks, I know, it’s too late, I  _ know. _

_ “I really loved you, you know?”  _ It repeats, and it is at one more of Martin’s voice and not Martin’s voice at all, full of static. The tape spools out from the recorder, wrapping around Jon’s hands, his wrists, holding him in place.  _ “I asked you to stay safe.”  _ He says now, the tape winding its way up Jon’s struggling arms.  _ “I told you not to die, and you couldn’t do that for me. I  _ **_loved_ ** _ you, and you were  _ **_gone_ ** _. You left me alone, Jon, I was all on my own.” _

I came for you, he wants to scream, but the Archivist has no lungs. He can only watch and listen and Know. The tape winds up his chest, his neck, into his mouth, down his throat. The ceiling fan spins on. The Archivist gags, choking, drowning, and falls to his knees.

  
  


Jon wakes up gasping, his cheeks wet, with Martin’s hand on his face. “Hey,” Martin says, so softly, “hey, you’re alright Jon. It’s okay.” His hand is gentle against the rough stubble along Jon’s jaw, his thumb sweeping along the sharp jut of his cheekbone. There are dark bags under Martin’s concerned eyes, and Jon isn’t sure if he managed to get any sleep at all. 

Jon grabs Martin’s trembling wrist, his thumb digging into Martin’s shaking pulse. “Sorry, I-” He lets out a shuddering breath and lets go, his hands falling limp to his lap, “sorry.”

Martin makes an upset noise, “Jon you don’t have to apologize. Nightmares are...kind of to be expected for us, I think.” 

Jon wishes that wasn’t true. Martin more than anyone deserves an uninterrupted night’s sleep. “Tea?” He asks.

“Sure,” Martin says, and moves to stand.

Jon reaches out and grabs Martin’s hand. “No, I uh- I can do it. You need to rest.”

Martin tangles their fingers together. “We can do it together.” He smiles and his eyes go soft, if Jon didn’t know any better he’d say the emotion in them was a lot like love. But it couldn’t be. Not anymore.

Jon smiles anyway. “Okay.”

There’s no cream in the fridge, or if there was at some point it was certainly not safe now, so they both take their tea with too much sugar. Jon doesn’t let his tea cool enough and burns his tongue, but it’s almost worth it just to feel the heat pool in his belly to remind him that he’s alive and he’s awake. He doesn’t take his eyes off of Martin, perched on a rickety second-hand chair he’d had since uni and hadn’t felt the need to replace yet. 

Martin watches him back, fingers trembling where they grip his mug too tightly. 

They should talk about it, probably. There’s a lot that has been left unsaid in the last few years between them, things whispered hastily into tape recorders when there was no one left to listen. There are things they should admit, openly and without fear. But Jonathan Sims is not a brave man. He clings to his coffee mug filled with Earl Grey, not steeped long enough and with too much sugar and not enough lemon, and lets the warmth of that rest in his palms like the warmth from a hand let go too soon. 

“We should talk about it,” Martin says after a while. His mug is empty but he keeps his hands around the well-worn ceramic anyway. “I mean, it’s been-”

“Yes,” Jon says, cradling his mug to his chest. There’s a sludge of sugar and leaves at the bottom that look like a hand held out in supplication. He places it in the sink. “Not tonight, though, I think.”

Martin breathes out a heavy breath. “Okay, I just-” He looks away, “okay.”

“Tomorrow.” 

“Sure.”

Jon clears his throat. “We should get some proper sleep, I think. It’s been rather a long day.”

Martin barks out a laugh devoid of warmth or mirth and it seizes Jon by the throat. “Yes, I think it rather has. I suppose I’ll take the couch?”

“No,” Jon says, albeit perhaps a bit too quickly, “No, I think- I think the bed is big enough to share. Unless you-”

“No, that’s- that’s fine.” Martin says.

Jon’s bedroom is as empty and cold as the rest of the flat, the air stale from the door being shut for so long. Jon has no clothes big enough for Martin to borrow to sleep in, so Martin just shrugs off his shirt and leaves his long sleeve under shirt on. His jeans will no doubt be uncomfortable to sleep in, but when Jon presses the matter Martin just waves it away.

They take turns using the loo, and when it comes time to turn off the lights Jon finds himself hesitating. His hand hovers over the lightswitch.

“Jon?” Martin asks, standing at the side of the bed. He looks as indecisive as Jon feels, so Jon makes his decision and turns out the lights.

“It’s okay, Martin,” Jon says.

Light from the street lamps outside breaks through the window, leaving a soft warm glow about the room. Jon climbs into bed and pulls the duvet up over his shoulders and feels Martin getting settled behind him.

“Jon?” Martin asks again into the dark, his voice a whisper.

Jon flops onto his back, turning his head toward Martin. There’s so much space between them. Jon hums in acknowledgement.

“Can I?” Martin asks, reaching out a hand into the space between them. He lays it there, palm up, for Jon to either take or disregard. 

Jon places his hand in Martin’s, feeling large fingers curl around his own and locking them in place. Even now, with the threat of something awful in the future weighing on Jon’s mind, this is the safest he has ever felt. Martin at his side, their hands clasped together. He could leave everything else behind if he was allowed to have just this.

Tomorrow they could deal with everything else, but for now Jon can just let himself hold on to Martin and rest.


End file.
